1. Field of the Invention
The invention is directed to a battery terminal harness and, more particularly, to an insulated battery terminal harness having improved fastening means preventing the application of reverse polarity voltage to a circuit connected to the harness.
2. Description of the Prior Art
For proper operation, many battery-operated electrical circuits including virtually all electronic circuits, must be connected to the battery with a particular polarity. The "positive" polarity input terminal to the circuit must be connected to the positive or plus terminal of the battery and the "negative" polarity input terminal to the circuit must be connected to the negative or minus terminal of the battery. To assure proper polarity connections, it is common to use batteries having dissimilar terminals and battery terminal harnesses having mating dissimilar connectors--generally a male stud-like connection and a female flexible peripherally spaced finger connection. By connecting the harness to the electrical circuit in the desired manner, the user can be assured that the battery is connected with the correct polarities since the battery terminals and the terminal connectors will mate with only the desired polarity. Nevertheless, reverse voltage can be applied to the circuit if the harness connectors are inadvertently pressed against the battery terminals in reverse orientation. While the battery terminals will not mate with the harness connectors in the reverse position, the short term reverse voltage applied to the circuit by such connection may damage or lessen the reliability of the circuit. Accordingly, it is common to protect the circuit against the application of short-term reverse voltage by means of an appropriate diode or other one-way protective device. This approach is not always desirable, however, since such protective elements introduce operative deficiencies and result in extra cost.
Patent application Ser. No. 3,419, now abandoned, discloses an inexpensive and effective means for preventing inadvertent application of short-term reverse voltage. It teaches the use of an insulating cover member on the battery terminal harness for preventing unwanted contact between one of the terminal connectors and the non-mating battery terminals.
Patent application Ser. No. 1,550 is directed to similar subject matter and is an improvement on the Ser. No. 3,419 now abandoned structure by simplifying and reducing the cost of such structure. Both applications are of common assignment.